8. Across the Sea
across the sea
Tatiana
I t is a very long, boring ride across the sea; we are not merely crossing it but sailing far to the north from Split to Ancona, Italy.
Day fades, and the sun sets—and it is one of the most glorious sunsets I have ever seen. I stand at the railing on the upper deck with Lash behind me, his arms wrapped around me, and we watch the huge red sun sink below the waves.
It grows cool, after that, and then cold. We go below, and the handful of passengers shrink away from us, even though we have kept to ourselves and were the ones being shot at. I realize, then, that I am still splattered with blood—it is on my clothing, and I can feel flecks of it when I run my fingers through my hair. And then there is Lorenzo, pale and peaked, his T-shirt stiff with dried blood, bandaged front and back.
I suppose we are a frightening group, especially considering we hijacked a ferry while taking gunfire.
We pass the hours talking. Scarlett replaces Solomon in the cockpit, and then it’s Solomon's turn to stretch out on a row of seats in the lower deck, and is soon snoring. Lorenzo sits in the row in front of Lash and me and he tells us amusing and thrilling stories of his time in the Brazilian military. Lash relates his own stories from his time in the German counterintelligence unit, and some from his time working for my father.
I have a few of my own stories, like the time I was kidnapped by a group of teenaged boys. It was a gang initiation, and they were young, naive, and foolish. They thought waving guns in my face—clearly unloaded, as if the daughter of Zagreb's most notorious gangster wouldn't know an unloaded revolver if she saw one—would ensure my cooperation. One of them tried to flirt with me, another kept threatening to "teach me a lesson," and the third apologized about twenty times.
When my father's men, guided to me by the tracker in my purse, burst into the room and assessed the situation, they all laughed until they cried. The poor boys pissed themselves when they came face to face with Tata's hardened, cold-blooded killers, armed with machine guns.
Lash and Lorenzo laughed—Lorenzo's laugh shifted to a pained groan.
"What did your father's men do to the boys?" Lash asks.
I shrug. "I don't know. Filip took me home, and I did not see what happened. I would imagine they were killed, though. Tata doesn’t play games with kidnappers.”
Lorenzo sighs. "Unloaded guns. Idiot children playing soldier." He shakes his head, rolling it against the back of the seat. "I experienced something like that once, after I got out of the army. A group of boys, maybe sixteen or seventeen years old. There were, oh, maybe six of them? I owned a pickup at the time. Nothing very nice, just a fourth-hand old Hilux. But these boys thought they could steal it from me, with me in it. They all had handguns and they were shouting and waving them in my face. Not one of them had a magazine in their gun, although I suppose there could have been a round in the chamber." He chuckles and then groans. "Ugh, ow. I gave them a good thrashing and took their guns away. An unloaded gun is only dangerous to the idiot holding it, I told them. If you point a gun at someone, it had better be loaded and you'd better be ready and willing to pull the trigger, or you have no business with a gun."
We doze, chat, and sometimes simply stare out the window at the black water and the starry sky.
Eventually, I doze off, my head on Lash's lap.
I wake up abruptly, and the stars above have been replaced with the amber glow of city light in the distance.
Lorenzo is gone, taking a turn in the cockpit, I assume, and Solomon and Scarlett are sitting with her back to his front, murmuring to each other quietly.
I am alone in the row of seats, my head against the window, pillowed by a folded jacket of some kind, and Lash is nowhere to be seen.
I find him at the prow, watching the lights grow gradually larger. I press myself against his back and wrap my arms around his waist, slide my hands up under his shirt and caress his pecs and abs. "What are you thinking about?" I ask in Croatian.
He shrugs. "The past and the future. What Leonora and Leander would be like, now. Who I would be if… that …had not happened." His answer is English—we've developed a habit of that, where I speak to him in my native Croatian, and he answers in English, which I comprehend better than I speak. "I am considering how we will get to Brazil. I am thinking that once all this is over with, I will happily swear an oath against killing. I have always felt like I have cheated my brothers. I have the brand, but I did not swear the same oath."
"You have mentioned a brand and an oath before. What are they?”
He turns and pulls up his shirt sleeve so the light from the cabin illuminates the inside of his bicep and the raised tattoo there. Not just a tattoo, I realize—he used the word "brand," and when I touch the stylized broken arrow the skin is raised—the arrow is branded into his skin and then tattooed over.
"What does it mean?" I ask. "And what is the oath?"
"The broken arrow symbolizes the other men and me. We are all warriors, and our experiences have broken us. Before, we were arrows in the quiver of the military. We were weapons. Our lives, our whole purpose was killing—bad people, yes, but still." He lets down his sleeve and turns back to the view of approaching Ancona. "It is layers of meaning. We are no longer arrows. We have chosen a different life. And also, we are all broken in some way. Our employer, who we only know as The Boss, or sometimes The Guardian, rescued us all. We all had enemies who wanted us dead. We had vices, addictions, and secrets. We all have closets full of skeletons, pasts full of ghosts.”
"And your boss gave you somewhere you could…not hide, exactly, but just…get away, I suppose?”
Lash nods. "Yes, exactly."
"And the oath?"
He recites. "Once you're in, there's no going back. Never take a life. Loyalty to the brotherhood above all."
"And the others, they all swore that oath. But you didn't?"
I shake my head. "No, I did not. I swore loyalty to the brotherhood, but I did not swear to not take a life. I have never known why. I should have. I often wish I had. Perhaps if I had, I would not have been so consumed with thoughts of revenge."
"Perhaps it was an oversight?" I suggest.
He barks a laugh. "No. Our employer does not make mistakes. Neither does Inez. I took the brand last. It was just me and Inez out in the desert outside Las Vegas. I never told the others that my oath was different. I was…ashamed, I suppose. Confused."
"Perhaps…" I trail off, hesitant to render my guess.
"Perhaps what, Lovely One?"
"Well, I know nothing but what you have told me, obviously, so this is only a guess. But what if he knew you would need to make the choice yourself?"
"What choice?"
"To pursue revenge…or not."
"Huh," he grunts. "You are a wise woman, do you know that?"
"It is the only thing that makes sense to me, that's all. I know nothing of the pasts of the other men. But I do know yours—what you have told me, that is. And if this mysterious man, your employer, does not make mistakes, if everything he does is with intent, then he had a purpose in removing that part of the oath only for you. What other purpose could there be?" I shrug. “He knew that someday you would have to choose to take your revenge against this Roberto Pugli or choose not to. You would have to be free to make that choice, and you would not be if you had sworn an oath not to kill."
He is quiet for a very long time, thinking. "I believe you are correct yet again." He snorts a laugh, shaking his head. "You have upended my entire life and everything I have tricked myself into believing."
"Lash, I—"
He twists in place, silencing me with a kiss. "I am indebted to you a thousand times over, Tatiana."
I shake my head. "There is no debt, Lash. Just…" I trail off, licking my lips. "Just…love me."
His black gaze is glittering and intense. "Tatiana, I—"
It's my turn to interrupt, to silence him with a kiss. "In time, Lash. We just met. I don't expect you to be in love. But that is what I want. It's all I want—for you to love me, someday, if you can." I swallow hard, my damned eyes burning yet again. "I know I cannot have your whole heart. Your beloved Ileana will always have it. But I will accept whatever you can give me."
“You deserve all of someone, Tatiana."
"That is for me to decide, isn't it? If I decide part of you is better than all of anyone else, then what can you say? Nothing. We make choices in life, Lash. You rescued me from Filip. You have protected me. You have shared your heart with me. You have shown yourself to me when I know damned well that you do not do so easily, or indeed at all. So, I choose you. I know my own mind." I lean against him, giving him all my weight, and sling my arms around his neck. "I have often been called impulsive, rash, even reckless. But I listen to my gut, my instincts, and my heart. I rarely listen to my mind, for I know the depths of my ignorance. But I know what I want and I know what I feel." I lean in, kiss him. "So if I choose to accept however much of yourself you can give me, then that is my choice to make."
He holds my gaze for a long time. "I cannot bring myself to argue the point, even if part of me thinks you are cheating yourself. I am a broken man. My heart is in pieces."
"I told you already—I am good at puzzles." I shake my head, and nuzzle his cheek. "Lash, I choose you as you are. Right now. Broken pieces and all."
“I just…I struggle to understand why."
"I don't know!" I shrug, laugh. "I don't know, Lash. The chemistry of love is a mystery, is it not? Why do we fall in love? What causes sexual attraction? Science gives one answer, poetry another. Who knows? I don't. You don't. But I know what I feel and I will not question it." I nuzzle his cheek again. "I have not been through what you have. If you need time to process, or sort through your feelings, or just learn to accept what you're feeling, that's okay. I can be patient. Just don't shut me out."
"I won't shut you out. I can promise you that much."
"Hey, captain says we're gonna be docking soon." Solomon's voice comes from the doorway into the lower deck.
I realize with a start that while Lash and I were talking we'd approached the marina. The lights of Ancona shine brightly against the dark of night.
We gather in the lower deck, away from the small huddle of frightened passengers.
"We have to be prepared for an exciting welcome," Solomon says. "We know the captain didn't contact anyone, but our departure wasn't exactly a secret, so we have to assume law enforcement will be waiting for us."
Lorenzo, looking less pale and much stronger, stares out at the rippling dark water for a moment. "What about a lifeboat? Deploy a lifeboat and we find somewhere else to get ashore."
No one disagrees with this plan, so we troop up to the cockpit. When Solomon presents the plan to the captain, the dour, weathered old man just shrugs.
"I have not speak to shore," he grouses. "Is no police."
" You haven't," Sol argues. "Someone else back in Split may have."
"Hmmm. Maybe, maybe. You wait. You wait. I call friend." The captain grabs a phone from a cupholder in front of him and places a call.
He speaks rapidly in what sounds to me like a Serbian dialect; being closely related to Croatian, I can follow his conversation, and he is asking if there is anything unusual happening ashore in Ancona.
Pausing to listen, he thanks his friend and ends the call. "Is okay. No police. Maybe people who shooted you in Split," he says, with a shrug, "but no police."
Solomon glances at Lash. "Could you understand him? Is he telling the truth?"
Lash nods and glances at me for confirmation—I answer. "Croatian and Serbian are close enough to understand. He tells the truth."
The captain looks annoyed to have been questioned, but says nothing.
"I think we chance it," Scarlett says. "I don't like the idea of being out on the open water in a lifeboat if I don't absolutely have to."
"Agreed," Lorenzo says.
"Agreed," Solomon says.
Lash looks at me and I shrug. "I am not the expert, do not ask me. Like Scarlett, I do not want to be on the ocean in a little boat if it is not needed. But I also do not want to be shot at again."
Lash wraps an arm around my waist. "Unfortunately, Lovely One, it is very likely you will take fire again before all this is over. I will do everything in my power to protect you, however."
I nod. "I know."
When we departed Split, there was only one crew member aboard, the rest were ashore preparing for departure. That crew member, a young man just past his teenage years, wears a thin jacket with the ferry line logo, as well as a hat. He is at the prow with a coil of rope in hand, preparing to dock.
I point at him through the cockpit window. "What if we disguise ourselves?"
Solomon blinks at me. “Why did none of us think of that?" He glances at the captain. "You have extra jackets and hats aboard?"
The captain glares at him, grumbling under his breath in Serbian about stupid, greedy Americans, but he nods, levering himself out of his seat, and hobbling bowlegged across the cockpit to a narrow closet. He rummages in the closet and comes out with five sealed packages. "Is all I have. Very expensive."
I shrug out of my leather jacket, reluctantly. "This is a very, very expensive jacket. Clean it up and you can sell it for a lot of money."
He takes it, turns it this way and that. "Your blood?" He asks me in Serbian.
I shake my head, answering in Croatian. "No. Not mine. He tried to rape and murder me."
He nods. "My wife will clean it up nicely. Maybe you come back and I will give it back to you."
I shake my head. "It's okay. It's just a jacket. We are sorry for causing you trouble. We are not bad people, we are just stuck in a bad situation." I hear Lash giving the others a summary translation of the conversation.
The captain shrugs. "Such is life, hey? Now, you must all leave me alone so I can dock the boat."
We don the coats and hats—the sizes are all over the place, so there is a lot of trying on, shrugging off, and trading until we are wearing sizes close to what fits us. Mine is too large, just like Scarlett’s, while the mens’ are all too small. Except for Lash’s, which is small in the shoulders and chest but long in the arms.
A few minutes later, the boat approaches the dock, and the engines grind noisily as the back end swings in toward the dock. The young crewman tosses the line ashore to a dockworker, who ties it off with expert speed. Before the boat has even settled, Solomon leads the charge, hopping ashore and extending a hand to Scarlett. Lorenzo is next, and then Lash, and Lash lifts me ashore.
It's dark still, the sun having not yet risen. A lone seagull wheels overhead, keening now and again. The marina is empty and quiet. A pair of dim yellow headlights glides along a road that runs parallel to the shore, vanishing into the distance. A dog barks somewhere far away. It's cold, and everything is dew-wet.
"Come on," Solomon says. "Gotta get scarce."
The road nearest the marina, however, is several feet lower than the rest of the city, with another road parallel to one that services the marina; there is no pedestrian access to the upper road, requiring a long walk to where the marina service drive splits off.
Not a soul is visible. The lone seagull is joined by a second, and then a third, and then half a dozen more as the sky lightens.
"This seems too fuckin' easy," Solomon says, scanning our surroundings with one hand in his jacket pocket—gripping his pistol, I assume.
"Maybe they assumed we'd have the ferry take the shortest route across?" Scarlett says.
Solomon rubs his face. "We probably should have. We just wasted twelve fucking hours."
Lorenzo claps him on the back. "I think this was best, my friend. It was unexpected. The time we lost going north we will make up by not having to shoot our way out of Ancona."
"But how do we get to fucking Brazil?" Sol snaps. "I used all my favors."
"After I left the army, I spent some time traveling for fun. I spent a good bit of time here in Italy, and I have even been here, to Ancona," Lorenzo says.
Solomon rolls his hand. "And?"
“Impatient Americans," Lorenzo mutters. “ And …there is an international airport here, but it only goes direct within Europe, since it is too small for transoceanic flights. To fly direct, non-stop, to South America, we need to get to a major city. Rome, London, Frankfurt."
Solomon nods. "Ah, I see. So the first step is a ride out of Ancona. Bus, train, or car. Public transportation is risky, since Pugli likely has us flagged for detention. How we'll get around that is a question for later."
Lash sighs. "I have an idea for that, but we need to get to Germany for it to work. I have contacts in the German military. I should be able to get us seats on a military flight, but I need to see my contact in person."
"So we steal a car?" Scarlett asks.
"I have enough cash that we could purchase something. It will not be very nice, but it would make smaller the risk," I say.
"You'd be throwing your money away," Scarlett says. "We'd leave it behind when we fly out of here."
I shrug. “It is my father's money."
Scarlett grins. "Well then, let's go buy a car."
Lorenzo guides us deeper into Ancona, which is sleepy but rousing. Cyclists on their way to work zip past us, paying us no mind in our ferry-worker attire. A taxi trundles past slowly, light on, hoping we'd be his first fare of the day. A delivery van beeps as it backs up along the curb next to a cafe; the outdoor seating area is being set up by a pretty young woman, the chairs unstacked and tables arranged just so, while within baristas calibrate the espresso machines, noisily banging the wands to discard grounds.
Lorenzo halts, eyeing the cafe. "We need to eat," he says. "Tatiana, give me your cash, and I will find us a car. Order us food and coffee and I will return as soon as I can."
I sling my backpack-purse off my shoulders and fish the stack of cash out of it, handing it to Lorenzo. He counts it swiftly and hands back a small stack, folding the rest and putting it in his hip pocket; he does all this with his good hand, keeping the wounded one immobile against his belly.
Lash converses with the young woman setting up the outdoor seating area—his Italian, he explains when the woman hustles off to get menus, is far from fluent but he can make himself understood. Moments later, we're seated inside in a back corner, out of view of the street. We get coffee and breakfast, ordering for Lorenzo.
Thirty minutes later, a dirty, rattling, rusty old Lancia sedan squeals to a halt outside the cafe, and Lorenzo emerges. We've all finished eating already and are sipping our coffees while we wait for Lorenzo.
He tosses the key on the table and hands me a much smaller stack of cash. "I got a good deal. We will have to hope we don't get into any high-speed chases, however, since I doubt it will reach ninety-five on its best day." He arches an eyebrow at Scarlett and Solomon. "That is sixty miles per hour, for you Americans and your idiotic imperial system."
Solomon snorts. "Thanks, pal, don't know what I'd do without you." He rolls his eyes. "I may be an American by birth, but I've spent more time outside the US than I have stateside. I'm all for the metric system."
"Same," Scarlett says. "But I am not really an American. I don't know what I am. I spent my career killing for America, but do I identify as an American? I don't know. Part of me still feels like I don't belong anywhere."
Solomon wraps his arms around her, pulling her against his chest—she goes stiff for a moment, frowning, and then softens. "You belong here, my love."
She allows the embrace for a moment and then pushes him away. "Work brain, Sol. Can't do sappy right now."
He just laughs. "Too bad, sweet tits."
She glares at him. "Call me that again and I'll cut your balls off while you sleep."
He just laughs all the harder and kisses the top of her head. She pretends to fight him off, but I can see her trying not to smile.
Lorenzo has polished off his food while this exchange has been going on. He takes a sip of his coffee, grimacing. "Cold." He takes it up to the barista, converses in Italian, waits, and receives a fresh espresso in a paper cup. “Okay, let's go. I know where we are going, so I will drive."
Solomon eyes him. "Sure you're good?"
Lorenzo gives him a flat stare. "Yes. I am sure."
Solomon holds up both hands, palms out. "Hey, man, I'm just asking."
“We are all professionals. You know your limitations. Trust me to know mine."
Solomon nods. "I do, Lorenzo. I wasn’t questioning you. I've been shot. The shock can catch up with you at weird times."
Lorenzo sighs, rubbing his jaw. "True, you are correct. I am just fearful for Inez. I need to get to her. I just found her again after many years and I am not going to lose her again."
Solomon grips Lorenzo's shoulder. “We'll get her back, man. she saved my life—all our lives. I owe her. we all do."
Scarlett nods her agreement. “She and I got pretty close back there. Us badass survivor bitches gotta stick together."
Lash claps a hand on Lorenzo's other shoulder. "Inez is important to everyone. But you must remember who she is. It is my feeling that Mercado will come to regret his decision."
Lorenzo nods, snorting a laugh. "That is true. She was content to leave things alone, but Rafael…he does not forget. He is vicious, it is true, and he will do his own killing, but he is not like us. He kills from a position of safety and power. When faced with gunfire, he flees and leaves the fighting to his men. He is a coward and bully. My Sophia will gut him like a fish."
Lash frowns. "Who is Sophia?"
Scarlett answers. "Inez. It's her real name—or her birth name."
Lash's frown deepens. "Sophia. Hmmm." The frown clears, and he shrugs. “It suits her, I suppose. She is still Inez to me, though."
"She will always be Sophia to me," Lorenzo says. He snags the keys from the table, and we head out to the car.
It stinks of cigarettes and engine oil. The exterior is red—or once was, at least, age and weather having faded the paint to a dull, chipped rust color. The interior is plasticky fake black leather, squeaky and uncomfortable. When Lorenzo cranks the motor, it coughs and wheezes like an old man, shudders, and then catches with a belch of blue-gray exhaust.
Solomon laughs, thumping a fist on the roof. “You sure this old beast will make it all the way to fucking Germany?”
Lorenzo laughs. "No, my friend, I am not. But it was the best I could do under the circumstances."
Solomon shakes his head, sliding into the front passenger seat. "May have to get out and push it up the mountain."
Scarlett grimaces as the engine sputters while idling. "Assuming we make it that far. I'm not criticizing, Lorenzo."
He chuckles. "Believe me, I know. I don't like it either. I managed to get a toolkit included, and I am pretty handy with engines, but without spare parts…"
"We will make do, whatever comes," Lash says. "Let us go. Time is wasting."
I take the middle seat, with Lash on my right and Scarlett on the left, and Lorenzo drives us through Ancona north and west on the E55.
For an hour or so, it's a quiet, easy, and peaceful drive.
And then I notice both Solomon and Lorenzo's shoulders tense up, and Solomon twists to look behind us.
The rest of us do, too—a sleek black BMW is behind us and closing in fast, with two more trailing behind it.
"Too easy," Solomon grumbles. "Fuckin' knew it. Buckle up, boys and girls. Shit's about to get interesting.”